


Bitches' Brew

by rayoflight



Category: Sleepy Hollow (TV)
Genre: Episode Tag, F/M, Wicca
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-01
Updated: 2016-06-03
Packaged: 2018-04-07 05:19:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,877
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4250832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rayoflight/pseuds/rayoflight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Here is yet another episodic fic. I wanted to do one taking place post-season two mess and after the flagship, S.S. Ichabbie  is consummated and sailing along. This one is about witches. Expect at least four parts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

 

Ichabod awoke bit by bit in the din of his shared bedroom in Corbin’s cabin.

He lay on his stomach with one arm curved above his head and the other clinging to the small woman curled up against his side. She was facing him in fetal position, her toes digging into his hip.  He stretched his lanky body as much as he could without jostling her too much and watched her slumber.  

Her lips were parted and a low grade sigh bordering on a snore emanated from between her lips.

She frowned slightly, snuggled closer to his form, and hummed.  

His heart seized in his chest as he gazed at her, this woman who had given herself, body and soul to him.  An act of courage for which he had yet to witness it’s equal.

He longed for her, even now as she lay beside him.  That would never go away, he knew.  Loving is the agony of constant want, even while in possession of it.

“I can feel your eyes on me, Ichabod. What are you thinking?”  she said.

Her eyes were still closed, her voice crackled with sleep and disuse.

He lifted her hand to his lips. “I am pondering the immense joy I am experiencing  merely resting my eyes upon your peaceful visage.”

She smiled, her eyes remaining shut.

He toyed with the satin ends of the tie on her headscarf, which dipped low over her forehead.

“Mmm. Stop that.  It’ll come off and I’ll have to beat you.”

She turned away from him with a frown, adjusting her body so he could spoon her, blindly groping for his arm and pulling it across her body, so his hand dipped low over her belly.

“I love my diminutive Lieutenant.” he sighed against the nape of her neck.

“Of course you do, I’m a sexy warrior woman from the future.” she huffed, with a loud yawn.

He chuckled and kissed her neck.

“Hear, hear.”  his hand creeped low and played with the small patch of curls above her sex. “That, you are.”

“Mmm…still sleepy, Crane.”

“Then allow me to ease you into a more comfortable slumber, my heart.”

She made a noncommittal sound, but parted her thighs nonetheless, bracing her uppermost leg upon his own. She threaded her fingers with his and guided his hand between her thighs.

He pressed his agile fingers against the site of her pleasure, eliciting a low whine from her throat and then circled ever so slowly.

She swirled her hips, so her backside undulated against his hardened length and soon they were both panting with want.

She reached back to free him from his boxer briefs and guided him between her legs. Ichabod purposely teased her slick opening, bumping the thick head against that sensitive bundle nerves above it.

“Mmmmm.”   

He kissed her shoulder and eased himself inside. Her eyes opened finally, and she looked back to meet his own as he ground his narrow hips against her backside. She reached behind herself and gripped his ass, urging him on.

At that, his face dipped into the curve of her neck and he picked up the pace, their bodies falling into rhythmic soft clap of flesh.

“Oh my...ab-bee! ” he whined shakily as he squeezed his eyes shut and huffed snatches of air at the shell of her ear.

Abbie opened her mouth wide, and let out a small squeak as their combined movements increased in pace and depth.

“He let out a long drawn out ‘yesssssssss’ as her orgasm took her, and Ichabod scissored his fingers at the top of the split of her, heightening her crest, following shortly behind with his own determined thrusts drawing out both his and her end.

“Oh my _god_ , Abbie…such bliss.”  he said with an exhausted chuckle and kissed her shoulder.

The sex was always good with them, as it was this intuitive thing.  They read one another better than themselves at times. The communication between them, damn near telepathic.

True trust wasn’t always an easy thing, it came slowly and with a few fumbles in obtaining.  After the mess of dispatching Ichabod’s 18th century attachments, Abbie took her leave, taking a much needed break from Ichabod to find her place with her sister and remaining blood.

She took all her leave at once, leaving town for three full weeks, while Ichabod sought income.  

He eventually found it, once again thanks to the blonde privateer, who had provided him with a fake degree and a contact from Oxford who owed him a favor and would vouch for Ichabod as a reference.

He applied for a position at the town college, teaching 18th century electives a few days per week and supplemented that with a few online college classes as well.

As it turned out, there was a resurgence of interest in the Revolutionary War, due to a popular streaming show and he managed to amass enough money for a small savings account and a debit card.

Some modern ways still tripped him up, but no more than some elderly (that he was) and he found that simple good breeding often brought him multiple strangers who gladly assisted and brought him up to speed.  Mind you, nearly all seemed to be under the impression that he was flattering them for a purpose other than graciousness and gratitude…

He still found no comfort in close proximity or touch in the modern era except with his Miss Mills.

Abbie returned from her excursion all aglow, with Jenny telling tales of a fling with the erstwhile reporter.

An ugly feeling which he well recognized seized his soul and he knew the folly of his foolishness in attempting to deny his love for her.

In the space of a weekend, Ichabod’s jealousy yielded determined claim, and the pair became a couple.

And so it was, that their quiet routine of newly consummated love and work, was interrupted by enemies neither had prepared for.

**  
**  


* * *

**  
**  


Four women dressed in functional hiking clothes, boots, khakis, and sweaty t-shirts of various size, color, and emblazoned slogan, lowered themselves, one-by-one into the same damp cave.

The leader was an athletic, tanned woman with dark-blonde hair cut into a functional pixie.  A handsome woman, her skin was weathered in a way that told the tale of a woman in her element outdoors, freckled and wrinkled.

She turned on her headlamp and scanned the space with it’s light.  
  
“You were right, Georgia.”  she said, addressing a woman next her with a mouse-brown ponytail.  “This is it.”  she whispered in awe.

“The Second Witness arose, right here.”

She knelt next to the gash in the earth Ichabod had clawed his way out of, feeling the texture of it between her fingers, while the other women examined the broken hexes surrounding it.

The woman closed her eyes and squeezed the dirt between her fingers and images assaulted her mind’s eye.  Ichabod gasping for air, crawling from the grave, wobbling along on weakened legs.  

_Drinking from the stream.  Almost being run over by the truck._

_Arrested._

_Questioned._

And yes…

_The First Witness._

The crushing weight of their immediate connection, -their bond.  How could they not know they were soulmates, right away? She mused inwardly.

She swooned.  

“Rachel?”  One of the women lay hands on her in concern, another blonde, this one whip thin and short.  The third, another brunette, with sweaty brown curls silently catalogued everything at the scene. And the final,  Justine was busily assessing what appeared to be a Mason compass engraved in the rock.

“I’m fine, Stella.”  She stood and addressed the three women before her, her coven.

“They are both within easy reach. It is as was written.  Sisters, we are blessed.  For we shall live to see the cycle broken.”

 _“Ah-men._ ” they all replied in unison.

* * *

Abbie got up from their shared bed and padded her way to the bathroom, scratching the exposed cheek of her bum while yawning noisily.  Ichabod watched her depart with comfortable relish. A haze of ease settled over him the like of which he’d not felt, even before his long sleep.

This was his place.  Where he was supposed to be, with his partner, lover, and equal in all things.  To know one’s “lane” as Abbie would say and to be on it, the long stretch of road before you marked with a clear direction.  He had sought it all his life, but this was the first time that he knew he was in it.

His hand unconsciously fanned out over the warm spot Abbie’s body had left on the bed beside him, his heart aching in the best possible way.  

_Constant longing._

He recovered his leather hair tie from the nightstand and gathered his dark auburn locks into a sloppy low queue.

He fired up his laptop and checked his students’ assignments.  This was his life now that the mess of his former life and hers were settled up. No demon in the woods, no delusional wife, no psychopath best friend or offspring, no undead friends, or rightfully resentful sisters.  They didn’t even have to subvert the new Sheriff.  Reyes, it turned out, was part of a benevolent secular organization of Witness ‘watchers’.

It was now simply Professor Crane, currently teaching classes;  mostly online, in easy cohabitation with his soulmate Lieutenant Mills.

On occasion, Abbie’s sister supplemented their normal daily tasks with curiosities and mysteries she had stumbled upon in her work and sometimes Abbie’s cases proved to be beyond the normal dark dealings of man...but they had grown accustomed to these things.  All urgency they had felt in the initial years of Witnessing was gone.

The adventure and romance of it tempered by the ease with which the capable team handled them all.

Abbie reappeared in their shared bedroom freshly showered, with the aroma of her favorite lotion wafting from her skin, a stimulating mix of pansies and ginger.  She padded about the space barefoot, donned only in her brassiere and panties, brushing her coif free of it’s “wrapped” style with a stiff boar hair brush.  One, she had admonished her partner for stealing on occasion.

_“The oils in it aren’t for your type of hair, Ichabod.  I know you use it, because I keep finding your flyaways in my hair!”_

He watched her shimmy into her skinny jeans with a vague smile before going to the kitchen to prepare coffee for the two of them.

He relocated his work to the kitchen table and Abbie silently joined him, properly attired for the start of her day.  Both ate their bagels and drank coffee in silence for a while before Abbie supplied a few tidbits of the case she was working on.

“Juniper Brush Park just fifteen miles northwest of Sleepy Hollow...Still in our jurisdiction, apparently.  Two people have gone missing from there in the past month, two teenaged girls, on two separate occasions. An extensive search yielded no sign of them.  But… there’s this.”

She opened her tablet and showed him a photo of a clearing, lined by giant boulders.  The boulders were covered in graffiti, the typical tags, and terrible doodles but Abbie zoomed in on one piece, clearly done by stencil.  It was old judging from the wear and the fact that the edges of it had been painted over a few times.  It appeared to be a circle at first glance.

But then Ichabod frowned and saw that it was in fact a snake eating itself.  

“Ouroboros.  The pagan symbol of the eternal nature of existence. No beginning. No end.”

“Yes, but look at this…”  

She zoomed in even further.  
  
“Yes, I see it.  Someone stenciled a break, a gap in this…Here.”

“And you think this has something to do with the girls’ disappearance?”

She sighed. “Well no one else in the department does, including Reyes, but something isn’t right about this.  My gut tells me this is a clue.”

“Well then, follow your gut.  It has not lead us astray yet.  I do find it odd that it would be there, of all places, and with that particular modification.  One might believe that whoever made it desires to break the very cycle of existence.”

"Exactly what I thought." 


	2. Embedded

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So, I let this story drop for a while because the damn show turned to shit. But you know what? Shit makes great fertilizer. I had a weird dream and figured out a way to continue this, while still keeping somewhat to canon. It may be ridiculous, but I'm heartened by the fact that nothing I come up with will be as mind-numbingly awful as where the actual show ended up. Enjoy!

"Dig",  Rachel said.  "We must find his hair for the splice to work."

All of the women sifted and sorted through the enchanted clay looking for Ichabod's hair.  Finally, Justine held up a long auburn strand in triumph.  Rachel took the hair and examined it, acknowledging Justine's good work with a smile and congratulatory pat on her arm.

"We only need the other Witness' in order to begin."

Rachel stowed the hair away carefully in a small ziplock bag and put it in her fanny pack.  The other women we're salvaging bits of the broken hexes that had surrounded him, taking in what they could of this old magic.

_Powerful magic for just one witch._

Word was her power drove her to madness and self-destruction. Gifted as she was, the substantial and unpredictable magic of a mother's love for her child tipped the scales so darkness would consume her.

Marrying a Witness who was not destined for her was bad enough, but the inadvertent conjuring delayed destiny.  Like mixing two volatile chemicals, Ichabod and Katrina's attachment created a dangerous explosive in the form of their son Jeremy.

 _Poor child._  She thought.   _None so young are meant to hold such power._

_The world is on an eternal tether, the serpent forever encircling us, imprisoning and stifling us while we continue on a path to ultimate destruction._

_We must stop it._

_The pale serpent has polluted this plane with vain conquest.  There is nothing that would stop such arrogance except a razing._

 

 

* * *

 

Abbie finished up her last case's paperwork and pulled up the symbol again on her laptop.  Ouroboros, the serpent eating itself, broken sharply.   An isolating reverse image search; an algorithm the department had just acquired turned up lots of occurrences of this particular variation of the symbol at old colonial landmarks.  

An ancient one was engraved in the stables of Mt. Vernon, another on the interior of the Liberty Bell...and on it went.

Her frowned deepened and her unease grew as she found more and more occurances of this variation of the symbol, all in places where young girls had disappeared.

She looked at so many, her eyes became strained and she rubbed them, opened them again and noticed a woman looking directly at the photo's source with a smile on her face. The illusion made it seem like the woman was looking directly at her. That combined with the fuzziness of the photo, reminded her of that fateful childhood encounter.

A deep chill went through her soul and she tried to zoom in.  

Unfortunately, the pixel degradation was in the source and therefore could not be clarified any further.  

The woman was just a vague smirking blur, seemingly staring right through her.

Moloch's phrase **"-Come and see."**  sprang to mind and the full body chill renewed in intensity.

She shut the screen abruptly, with trembling hands, stretched and got up from her desk.

She walked down the halls and outside into the fresh Fall air.

The sent a quick text to Ichabod on her smartphone.

 

**this is case is so much bigger than I thought**

**- _need me with you?_**

**no, finish up ur classes**

**we'll work it out after my shift**

_**\- ok. if you need me sooner do not hesitate to send me another missive.  yours, ic** _

 

 

Abbie slipped her phone back in her pocket with a wan smile and turned to go back in, halting suddenly as her eyes crossed what appeared to be the same woman from the image she'd found online.   Same short blond hair, at least and she was staring at her with a smile from across the parking lot

Abbie's blood ran cold and she automatically put her hand on the handle of her revolver, starting to cross the lot. The woman winked at her and not a moment later a van crossed in front of her.  After it passed, Abbie saw that the woman was gone.

Abbie cursed under her breath and went back inside, hoping one of the two sketch artists the department had on call wasn't busy.

 

* * *

 

 

Crane stood at the podium of the small auditorium, speaking about the various men who appeared in the powerpoint presentation projected on the wall behind him.

"Franklin was filthy little man who's admitted brilliance has come to overshadow his eccentricities..."

His students were mostly retired amateur historians, with a few young students looking for an easy class to fill their required elective so, enthusiasm was a mixed bag. 

When he got to Hamilton, he noted the younger students perked up.  ...Thanks to a hit broadway musical, which having listened to the soundtrack, was oddly closer to reflecting the actual spirit of the times from which he'd hailed than all of the stuffy recorded history textbooks he'd read since arising.

The questions flew, the kind of character questions he would gladly have supplied answers to without prompting.

He smiled and basked in the pleasure of answering, _in detail._

Georgia sat at the back of the auditorium and took it all in.

 

 

 


End file.
